Today's News

The first time I had Steak Diane was years ago at a fancy restaurant. Popular back in the ’50s and ’60s, when and where it actually came about is unknown.

New York City is probably the best candidate for the source of Steak Diane, but which restaurant was the birthplace would be difficult to identify.

The top culinary trend of that time was dishes that could be flamboyantly prepared tableside. I remember being really impressed with the theatrical antics arising from the flambéing of the cognac that was used to make the sauce.

I didn’t so much think about becoming a vet, I just was. Some say it’s a “passion” while others call it “pathology.” Either way, working and living with animals is all I’ve known since I was “knee-high to a grasshopper” as we used to say in South Georgia.

Sure, it’s hard to become a vet and even harder to be one, but it’s the only thing I’ve ever seen myself doing.

OAK ISLAND—After more than a decade of seeking funds, planning and designing, the former Brunswick County Airport has received additional runway space and has transformed itself into an executive-jet-worthy destination.

Now, the newly christened Cape Fear Jet Port, near the base of the Oak Island Bridge, has a 5,505-foot runway, allowing for charter aircrafts, executive jets and, eventually, aircraft bringing in supplies during emergencies such as severe hurricanes.

BOLIVIA—Legal advisers for the Brunswick County Board of Education say schools cannot opt out of recent state-mandated reproductive health and safety education curriculum, despite the wishes of several board members.

Last month, board members Catherine Cooke and Shirley Babson wanted the board to pass a policy requiring parents to opt in if they wanted their middle school children to take part of the state-mandated curriculum, which will be added at the start of the 2010-2011 school year.

The chairman of the N.C. State Ports Authority says the N.C. International Terminal project planned for the Southport area cannot go forward as long as the state legislature and the area’s representative in Congress are against it.

That’s the main reason the authority announced last week the project has been placed “on hold,” board of directors chairman Carl Stewart said.

Shallotte police are investigating the theft of $7,136 from East Coast Sweepstakes on 200 S. Willis Drive.

The business owner reported the theft, stating an unknown suspect took the money, which had been collected over the past couple of days. The alarm company reported that when the business closed Saturday morning at 4 a.m., nobody went back in until 9 a.m. Sunday morning, at which time the owner discovered the money was missing.

LELAND—Dale Ward and his father, Lloyd, have “day jobs” as owners and operators of Affordable Towing here in their hometown, but their passion is restoring old tractors.

In their neighborhood off Lanvale Road, the Ward family has several tractors in various states of repair, including a nearly complete 1951 John Deere, which will soon be ready to make the rounds at tractor shows.

It’s a good thing we use battery back-ups, or the space for this week’s column would be blank inches of newsprint.

Monday’s mid-afternoon downpour in Shallotte caused a chorus of thunder and lightning—causing the Beacon’s power to flicker and computers to begin their own chorus of buzzing and other gut-wrenching sounds—before the rain ever fell.

BOLIVIA—Testimony for the defense began Monday in the civil trial of former Holden Beach police officer Terri Oxford, who sued the town of Holden Beach for wrongful termination and gender discrimination after she was fired from the police department in 2008.

Attorneys for Oxford rested their case Monday afternoon, a week after the trial first began in Brunswick County Superior Court.